Do You Know Where You’re Going To?

The Last Mile

Slightly ruffled the female sounding voice said: “YOU FINAL DESTINATION IS NOT ON A DIGITIZED MAP” – as if asked, how do you get to Santa’s house? Then, with a second thought, the GPS reluctantly gave a route to follow. When reaching the end of the paved roads, she naively said: “YOU HAVE ARRIVED!” Wishful thinking and self proclaimed success – but not worth celebrating and not exactly true — since I’m standing about a mile from the destination.

While we once unfolded our maps and plotted our courses, now our navigation systems handle all the unfolding and plotting and even re-routes us when the odd reindeer is blocking our path. And this is fine for ordinary destinations, but for those less traveled mountains, remote beaches, or arctic expeditions — we don’t exactly know how we will get there or what we will find — and that’s part of the point of going.

Creativity treks far into the less traveled, the out-of-the ordinary, and uncharted. Creating is often messy, and the muddy footprints we leave show that our path isn’t always a straight one. If we do have a map and neatly follow the path to the end, it may leave us blind to some opportunities along the way – however, on the other hand, with no general direction, we may never leave the grid — And we can’t rely on others to unfold our map and plot our course. Whether we start by planning or not, we often don’t know our final destination until we get there.

Ralph Waldo Emerson said: “Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” We can make resolutions and plan for the year ahead but our final destination is not on a digitized map. I’m thankful for all your support and wishing you a creative and wonderful New Year!